Word of Salvation – Vol. 43 No. 37 – October 1998

Your Supreme Saviour

A Sermon by Rev. P. Smit on Colossians 1:15-23

Scripture Reading: Psalm 148

Suggested Hymns: BoW: 136a; 217; 174; 211; 159
                                              Rejoysing-2: 281; 401; 498

Congregation.

In the Christian church, there are certain people who say that, unless you speak in tongues, you cannot be a Christian.  There are those who say, unless you know in depth the teaching of one particular Christian leader, you're only half a Christian.  In the Christian church, some may be looked down on as unspiritual, because they haven't experienced a close encounter with God in one form or another.

There is one major problem with all of these views.  Each one adds rules and regulations to the basics of the gospel.  The Gospel is simply the good news about Jesus, that he died, and rose, and ascended into heaven, and if we believe he died for us, and if we live for him, we will be saved.

The apostle Paul said that, if any one distorts the gospel, or adds to it, they ought to be under God's curse.  In Paul's day, some people had come into the Colossian church and were saying that, unless you have a secret knowledge of God that goes beyond the Scriptures, you are not saved.  False teachers were coming in, combining Jewish legalism, man-made rules, with a dangerous heresy called Gnosticism.  They claimed that they had a secret knowledge that was necessary in order to gain salvation.  It was secret knowledge available only to an exclusive group of people.

Their message was: "There is something much deeper than Jesus Christ.  Jesus is good.  You need him, but you need more than that.  You need this special knowledge.  It'll give you a much deeper meaning to your life and it'll guarantee that you will be saved."

How alluring this type of message is.  It mixes the basics of the gospel with extras that seem attractive.  No doubt the Colossians thought, "Here's something I can do to make sure I get to heaven."  But when we consume false teaching, and feed on it, like Adam and Eve, it leads to bondage, it leads to disillusion, it leads to sin, and it leads to hopelessness.  Bit by bit, an inch at a time.

Paul doesn't hold back anything in declaring the essence of the gospel.  It is this good news about Jesus that Paul cannot compromise.  He teaches the truth of the gospel forthrightly.  In this way he challenges the false teaching.

He begins by telling the Colossians that:

1.  Christ is Your Creator

The Gnostic false teachers believed that Jesus was not divine - He wasn't God.  They believe Jesus was infused with God, but God left him at the cross.  Jesus was only a man.  The false teachers said that the spirit world possessed the key to all spiritual power.  They even advocated the worship of angels (2:18).  But with one sweeping blow Paul cuts through those lies and tells the truth about Christ.  He tells us that Jesus Christ alone is supreme because "He is image of our invisible God" (vs.15).

Jesus told us that God is spirit – he doesn't have a body.  He's not an old man with a long beard but he is spirit.  Jesus is the exact representation of God.  In Christ we see God in the flesh.  When you see Jesus reach out to lepers with healing in his touch, you're seeing God's love.  When you see Jesus, patiently teaching his slow-learning disciples, you're seeing God's endless patience.  When you see Jesus forgiving his executioners, you're seeing God's amazing forgiveness.  Jesus is God with skin on.  Jesus said: "Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father... The words I say to you are not just my own.  Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work..." (Jn.14:8-10).

Jesus Christ alone is supreme because he is God and because all things were created by him (vs.16).

It was Jesus who created earthly, visible things, from the soaring mountain peaks of the Himalayas and the immovable crest of Mount Everest, 8.5 km high, to the 10 km depths of Mariana Trench in the Pacific Ocean.  The Bible says in Genesis 1:1, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."  God had said of man "let us make man in our image."  As the story of God's revelation unfolds, we see that God created all things through Christ.  Jesus was the one who spoke and the vast array of birds, fish, insects, mammals, reptiles were brought to life.  It was Jesus' creative authoritative powerful word that formed the blazing 350 degree heat of Mercury to the minus 230 degree cold of Pluto at the fringe of our solar system.  Jesus made it all!

That's just the visible – the things we can see.  He also made the heavenly invisible things: the angels, seraphim, cherubs, the creatures before God's throne.  All these things were made by Christ and for him.  They are the beautiful jewel in his crown.  They are the display of his glory and majestic power.  As supreme creator, he is before these things, he himself is not created.  When he is called the firstborn in verse 15, it refers to his unique position and superiority.  Jesus is before all this, he is the eternal God, and in him all these things hold together.

He is actively supporting this world, by his power.  Christ is supreme because he is your creator.

But added to that,

2.  Christ is Your Ruler, Paul says.

If anyone mixes wrong teaching into the basics of Christianity, you end up devaluing the person and work of Jesus Christ.  If you say you can only be a Christian if you have this special knowledge or this special experience, by that you downgrade the sufficiency of what Jesus Christ has done.  You add rules not given by the Ruler.

Paul stresses that Jesus is our only Ruler.  We need to submit to his truth alone.  "He is the head of the body" (vs.18).  In other words, he is the ruler of the church.  He has proved that headship, by rising from the dead.  Like a champion for our cause, he has gone to heaven, as our supreme ruler.  He is exalted to the highest place, and has a name that is above every other name – so that we can confess that Jesus is LORD.  There is no higher place, no higher authority, there is no higher position under God the Father, then that of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Someone has written that since his ascension, "19 centuries have come and gone, but it is true to say, that all the armies that ever marched, and all the parliaments that ever sat, and all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not affected life upon this earth as much as this ONE SOLITARY LIFE – JESUS CHRIST."  And God has promised that his reign will have no end.  Jesus is our Ruler.  As our head, Jesus guides his church.  He leads us, he empowers us, he helps us, he will never leave us.  He said, "I am with you to the very end of the age" (Matthew 28:20).

Christ is supreme because he is your Creator, and because he is your Ruler, but more than that,

3.  Christ is Your Saviour

The Gnostic teachers were saying, "You need the fullness of this secret knowledge.  Your life will only be full when you embrace this new teaching."  Paul says, God's fullness comes to us in Jesus Christ.  The fullness of our joy comes from acknowledging that we were sinful people.  That before we knew God's love, our hearts, our thinking, our lives were alienated from God (as it says in verse 21).  Our self-centred evil behaviour demonstrated that.  For some of us our evil behaviour is still a live and painful memory.

But the amazing news is that Jesus came to save us.  He came to reconcile us to God; to rebuild the bridge to the loving embrace of our heavenly Father, by making peace with God.  The only way that peace could be made, was by a payment of an extreme price.  Jesus, God's perfect, sinless Son, needed to die in our place.  He bore our sins in his body on the tree.  He shed his blood so that I can go free.

Can you ever comprehend, how much God loves you, that he was willing to reconcile you to himself, at the cost of his own son Jesus?  That is love of another kind.  Extraordinary love – to take me, and you, who were by nature his enemies, and to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation.

You came to God filthy, clothed with the rags of your sinfulness, and when you came to him with a sorry and repentant heart, God took you, he washed you, he cleansed those dark embedded stains of guilt and condemnation, and he wiped them spotlessly clean.  Through Christ's work he has brought you into his holy presence and declared to all: "this child of mine is pure, clean and holy.  There will be no charge brought against him.  He is free."

Never ever let anyone tell you that you need anything more that Jesus' death on the cross to pay for your sin.  Never ever let anyone entice you with lies that say you need more than Jesus to be saved.  You don't need anything extra than to know Jesus Christ as your Lord and King.

Paul says He is the supreme Creator, He is the supreme Ruler, He alone is the supreme Saviour.  He has won your salvation.  It is by God's grace you have been saved.  But that grace must be responded to.  You cannot follow and serve Christ as Your Creator, Ruler and Saviour, without clinging to him in faith.  Jesus' love and grace to you demands nothing less than your commitment, faith, and trust.

Paul says in verse 23, "You are reconciled by Christ – if you continue in faith, established and firm, not moved from the hope held out in the gospel."

God is calling you to stand firm.  Don't be swayed by people that say you need anything else for the Christian life except to know Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour.  Stand firm in your faith, don't be moved from your only hope.  Your only hope is: that Christ is your Creator, Christ is your Ruler, and Christ is your Lord and Saviour – who loves you and who has set you free.

Amen.